


Phoenix

by Mx Felicia Rondo (SolarSys), WynneCluster



Category: Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comic), Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW Comics), Sonic the Hedgehog (Video Games), Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Ian Flynn sucks tho, It's the one you think it is, Karl Bollers gets too much hate, Mild comedy, Not terribly relevant just wanted to mention, Tania Del Rio should've gotten more work, The Archie comics were pretty cool sometimes, trans MC
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:08:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24251119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolarSys/pseuds/Mx%20Felicia%20Rondo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/WynneCluster/pseuds/WynneCluster
Summary: Several weeks have passed since the defeat of Eggman and the destruction of the Phantom Ruby, and everything has gone back to normal... Or has it?With the appearance of a mysterious hedgehog, strange behaviors from old Eggman bases, and yet more mysteries abounding it seems that the war has left behind more than just scars on the land...
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	Phoenix

A thunderous crash rang through the streets of Spiral Hill Village, followed by a “Sorry!” that was almost just as loud in the once-tranquil sleeping village. Tangle the Lemur, resident of the village whom everyone knew of even if she didn’t know them, had smashed her face in for the umpteenth time that week. It was a new day.

Sun shone through the shades of the window, hitting the eyes of an otherwise disoriented girl in a way she knew she fucking hated. She stretched until she heard something crack, surveying the room she had been staying in and noting the articles of clothing laid out on her bedside table. A ratty leather jacket, some old green boots, and a gaudy red pair of sunglasses.

One at a time, she donned a tight purple tube top, a different and much less-ratty leather vest, a pair of grey cargo shorts, some slick black fingerless gloves, and finally she stepped into a pair of big stompy purple boots. After a moment’s consideration she carefully picked up the shades.

She eyed them carefully as she stepped outside of the house and walked past all of her ‘neighbors’ cheerily greeting her, not acknowledging a one of them. She had much more important things than ‘manners’ on her mind that day. When she had left the village and eyesight of its inhabitants, she gave one more look at the sunglasses, before tossing them to the ground in disgust, then lining her boot up to get just the right angle...

She stamped her boot hard onto the shades and took a deep breath. It had taken several months to recover and sort out what had happened, but finally it was all clear.

The mysterious and dramatic girl chuckled and grinned with her unnaturally-sharp teeth.

"Just you wait, Sonic the Hedgehog," she intoned ominously as she stared forward with piercing blue eyes, "your time is almost up."

Meanwhile, Sonic the Hedgehog was enjoying an entirely peaceful and unassuming day. It was serene and gorgeous. He had a very fulfilling nap.

Some weeks later he was running through the woods, not a care in the world. So lost in the bliss of running that if a terrible and ominous and dramatic event were to occur he would never see it coming.

Completely blocking out the world around him, he took a break to hydrate himself with a water bottle he'd taken with him. Standing there, totally open and vulnerable, he had no idea what terrible things were about to happen.

Thankfully they were happening several miles away and to the devious Dr. Eggman’s robots, which were more trouble than they were worth anyway. Sonic's day was entirely pleasant and uneventful.

By the time the arbitrary date Tails had marked on the calendar as the most likely date of Eggman's next attack (circled in red as 'today' right between 'yesterday' and 'tomorrow') came and went without troubles, Sonic was starting to get worried.

Everyone in Tails’ lab could tell, as he was pacing at such a supersonic rate that the wooden floorboards were wearing down. When both Knuckles and Tails shot him a look over it, Sonic gave a nervous smile and sat down… though his anxiousness remained ever-present in the ears of everyone in his vicinity, as he tapped out a drum solo on a counter with his fingers that would make his 1990’s cartoon brother blush.

"I don't like it," the coolest dude named Sonic the Hedgehog said, "It's already over a week past 'today' and no sign of 'buttnik at all!"

Tails nodded, passively accepting the reference to the Sonic the Hedgehog animated series originally broadcast from 1993 to 1994 though commonly referred to as just 'Sonic SatAM.'

"I don't get it," Tails replied, frustrated that his prediction of a living being with his own priorities and needs was somehow incorrect, "Eggman attacks us so ridiculously regularly that I usually use his schemes to decide when to buy a new toothbrush."

"There are more important things than dental hygiene right now Tails!" Knuckles yelled and slammed his palms down on the table, splitting into neat and even quarters, "what if Eggman attacks Angel Island and steals the Master Emerald again?"

Tails eyed his angry friend with a bored and somewhat disappointed stare.

"Firstly, that table is almost as old as my house and you just reduced it to so much garbage in a nearly physically impossible manner," Knuckles almost turned even redder at Tails' words, "secondly, you're almost always down here and away from Angel Island anyway, and it's like everyone just forgot the Master Emerald exists nowadays."

Knuckles grumbled and turned away, ignoring the ever-so-subtle dig at the writing of the Sonic the Hedgehog games in recent years and faded out of the conversation as he was not relevant to the story at that time.

"Well, I'm not taking this sitting down!" Sonic said, quickly standing up so as to avoid any hilarious remarks about how he is sitting down actually, "If Eggman thinks he can stand me up like this, he's got another thing coming!"

With that, Sonic sped out of the house before anyone could linger on the uncomfortably romantic undertones of the cerulean speedster's latest quip.

Sonic didn’t have a particular plan or destination in mind when he started running, but that was fine since he was used to planning on the fly and it was absolutely one of his good points and not at all a maladaptive coping mechanism for his tendency to rush ahead despite the advice of others. He smirked in self-assurance and decided on the fly to change course towards one of Eggman’s old bases.

One might ask the question ‘Why doesn’t anyone dismantle Eggman’s old bases after he’s defeated?’ and they’d immediately get a very withering look from everyone who’s ever worked the post-Eggman logistics job (except for Knuckles, who’d instead scream ‘no, not this again!’ to the sky in anguish). The simple truth was that between the automatic security systems, numerous pits, spikes, random robots with laser guns, large stretches of pits with no way to traverse them aside from very thin rails, and tantalizing collectables right in the worst of the danger it was legitimately safer and simpler to just wait until Eggman took the base over and remodeled it rather than risk even approaching one.

Sonic liked taking runs through them on weekends for a gentle change of pace sometimes.

Of course, this was no simple weekend run for the world’s favorite hero. It was more like a social visit, if “social” was a codeword that meant “spinning into a ball to smash robots”.

Sonic messed up a few dozen parties before that particular misunderstanding was cleared up.

Which was something the blue blur had little time to dwell on as he approached Eggman’s base, completely unaware of what was to await him. While he had last left the Doctor’s base in a somewhat semi-operational state before, he now found it-

“Destroyed?” he exclaimed as if to finish the narration as he glanced about at the wreckage of his greatest foe’s former factory, “but why, and by who?”

Sonic knew full well that very few ever bothered or dared to go near old Eggman bases, so his list of suspects was very short.

“Team Dark?” he asked himself as he studied the broken and burned-out husk that was once a terrifying military base, “no, there’s too much left intact for this to be Omega, Rouge would have just snuck inside, and Shadow wouldn’t bother breaking down walls when he has Chaos Control…”

The blue hedgehog walked through the busted down gate leading into the compound, studying the damage done.

“Actually, it’s not too different from what I might’ve done if I was feeling particularly cranky…” suddenly a light went on in his head and he glanced around at the robotic wreckage around him, “maybe my old partner, since I taught ‘em a fair few of my tricks… no…”

He frowned again, both at being set back to square one with supposition and at the realization that his newest buddy probably wasn’t the perpetrator. He’d kind of been hoping to see them the next time Eggman announced some kind of ridiculous scheme, but instead way too long had gone by and they hadn’t showed up at all since then. Not that he was looking super hard or anything. He had plenty of friends and he was totally fine not hearing from a few of them for a while.

“No way my ol’ buddy’d come busting in without one of their wispons,” he looked carefully, but it was clear the ‘bots had all been totaled by hand, so he just sighed a little and looked up with a mild grimace, “you were one tough cookie, but no powerhouse like me or Knuckles.”

As he examined the trashed robots and busted up infrastructure he went through the rest of his list of who might have been able to do it- and why they probably hadn’t. Ultimately he couldn’t pin it down. Everyone he knew of with the ability to do it either handled things in ways that were inconsistent with the wreckage or else had no reason to trash an old base like this, which meant…

“There’s a new player in the game,” Sonic chuckled and flicked his nose with his thumb, “and if they have it in for the Eggman, that might explain why my favorite arch-enemy’s been such a no-show lately!”

Sonic ran out of the base and moved the bottom of his gloves enough to reveal an inconspicuous wrist radio hidden there. With a simple button press he was in contact with-

“Tails,” he spoke into the device, failing to hide any of his excitement, “you’ve been plotting out the pattern of those rogue ‘bot attacks, right?”

The attacks Sonic was referring to had started shortly after Eggman’s latest defeat, and were assumed to just be remnants of his forces following whatever their programmed standing orders were. Since the bad doctor had gained more traction in taking over the world than ever before, nobody raised an eye at the occurrences.

Sonic and a lot of the other Resistance all-stars were helping out at first, but the regular members had more than enough experience that it was deemed enough to just set up defensive outposts and let everyone do as they would. If the attacks increased in intensity then the world’s usual heroes were ready to step in, but nobody felt it was likely necessary.

“Uh, yeah…” Tails replied, trailing off as some rustling ‘checking sciency notes’-esque sounds came from the other end, “I noticed that the attacks seemed to be fading out faster in a rough line starting from the Spiral Hill area and moving towards the Eggman Empire Fortress, but I’ve been waiting for the Chaotix to be available before I go investigate.”

“Yeah, waiting for back-up’s probably the smart thing with this kinda mystery,” Sonic noted as he turned to the direction of the Empire Fortress and started running, “I’m surprised they didn’t jump at the chance for paying work though, given Vector’s usual complaints.”

“He said something about a ‘poetic caper’ and hung up suddenly,” Tails chuckled a little, “I’m pretty sure I heard Charmy laughing in the background, so it’s probably some kind of comical misunderstanding or whimsically blown out of proportion event.”

“Good ol’ Team Chaotix…” Sonic chuckled, remembering the story of the legendarily anticlimactic ‘mystery of Vector’s missing pudding’ Charmy had regaled him with, “thanks for the update anyway, Tails, I need to get running.”

“I thought you’d say something like that…” Tails sighed and chuckled some more, “I’ll go ahead and grab Knuckles and the Tornado just in case there’s an ambush waiting for you at the Fortress.”

“You know me SO well, little buddy!”

Sonic quickly ended the call and hid his radio back away in the puffy folds of his glove, never to be seen or referenced again unless the narrative somehow called for him to talk to someone while running again.

And run he did. With that bit of focus captivated in that call with his beloved pal now freed up, Sonic blazed ahead the same way he went just weeks prior. Everything in his periphery was now but a blur in his sight, as the Eggman Empire Fortress faded into view.

Taking care not to let any rocks or fallen branches trip him out of one of his trademark dynamic entrances, he reached the fortress in as many minutes as one trip to the fridge to nab some more olives to snack on would take for someone much slower than him. Like Knuckles.

“Chaos, that was such a sick burn,” Sonic said to himself, before stopping in his tracks when he got just close enough to notice the place had, like the other bases, already been totaled. This time, however, someone else was still there on the scene--posing dramatically on a cliff, to boot.

The figure turned slowly to face him, revealing the blue eyes of a green hedgehog sporting a tasteful leather vest. Before he could call out to her, however, she spoke up.

“Knew you’d show up if I kept #@$%ing these places up,” she spread her arms wide and grinned, her pointed teeth shining, “now how about you and me have a nice chat, hero.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Behold! It's the Archie/IDW Sonic fan-fic Fixperience you never asked for but have always been waiting for!
> 
> So basically we've been reading an inadvisable amount of Archie Sonic, which has given us some good 2020 hindsight on the comics - in that there's a ton of bullshit in them that persists into the IDW comics. xp Bullshit you can now thank for this fan-fic's existence! - Felicia
> 
> A new fanfic begins! And the first collaboration of what should hopefully be a lot of collaborations.
> 
> This one is an idea that I've had for a long while and it's something I really want to do justice. The initial draft I wrote was just part of the intro and a more bare-bones version of that scene in Tails' lab. The remainder was written by both myself and Felicia with us commenting on each others' work and editing everything to make it a (hopefully) pleasant experience for all you readers.
> 
> And yes we'll be telling you her name next chapter, don't worry. - Wynne


End file.
